If there is a viral video on the Internet, you know it's on YouTube. You can search for it, find it, see the view count, and then take that link and share it with whomever you want. That's what we are doing for images.
The successful entrepreneurs that I see have two characteristics: self-awareness and persistence. They're able to see problems in their companies through their self-awareness and be persistent enough to solve them.
I'm probably most proud of the fact that we are bootstrapped and that we are able to do not just the typical Silicon Valley startup thing. We are basically throwing away all the typical conventions of other startups.
People come home from work, and they just want to unwind.
As long as we continue to bring in more traffic, I'm much more concerned with building a good user experience and developing tools that will help grow the Imgur community of users.
We're not going the photography route. I think there is a real distinction between photos and images, and Flickr is for photos, and Instagram is for photos. You wouldn't put a filter on a meme; you'd put a filter on top of a photo that came from your camera.
Imgurians increasingly live on their mobile devices, and we wanted to make it as easy as possible for them to browse and discuss Imgur's content wherever and whenever they want.
Being bootstrapped is great. You own 100 percent of it. But the downside is that you aren't able to move as fast as you want.
When I was a student, I was working at the technology call center, where students call in if they can't get their email to work or something. A minimum-wage kind of job.
We want people on the Internet to go to Imgur for their viral image fix. And what's so awesome about images vs. videos is that instant gratification.
We've talked with over a dozen VCs and angel investors over the years. But we've never clicked with any of them until Andreessen. During our initial meeting, we were bouncing ideas around about where Imgur could go.
The office has a really fun 'community' feel, kind of like Imgur itself. The things that you see that are on the walls and on our desks came directly from our users.
If you're even on the fence about hiring someone, that person is a no. You have to feel it in your gut.
I don't have much time to read. I'm more of a problem solver. I'll have an idea or a problem, and I'll learn what's necessary in order to do the idea or solve the problem. If I need to read a book, then I will, but it usually comes down to researching on the Internet and reading blog posts.
Imgur isn't about following a celebrity, and it's not about following a person in real life. You don't have to build up a massive following and use that to get your distribution.
People can express themselves better with images than just text, so they communicate more this way.
We try hard to provide the best user experience possible, and that means the best ads possible, so we work with the brands to come up with the best images.
We're trying to be a content destination for viral images and to be an entertainment destination in general.
GIFs work because the punch line is instantaneous. It's entirely different from almost any other form of content on the Internet, which takes time to consume.
Revenue is not where the focus of the company is at. We are focused on pushing out cool products like our analytics.
